Today's educators are passionate about shifting the standard classroom towards technology rich, collaborative spaces that support multiple types of learning environments (e.g. individual; peer-to-peer; problem based; hands-on; student-centered). On the other hand, facilities planners are challenged to create solutions within existing, restrictive structures that respond to the educational program-driven needs yet are flexible enough to adapt to rapidly changing requirements. The intensity of discussion is compounded by the fact that the operations and maintenance team is simply trying to maintain facilities to provide the minimum requirements of being warm, safe and dry with significantly fewer dollars for capital renewal than in years past. Unfortunately, the concept of developing a prioritized approach to support 21st century needs across a cross- section of stakeholders is frequently idealized, but rarely realized. The only way to achieve 21st century needs is to holistically evaluate the relationship between the built environment and how it directly impacts learning. To do this, one needs to understand all of the aspects of effective and sustainable educational facilities. This article describes a prioritized approach to support 21st century needs with limited resources. Once known to be associated only with manufacturing settings, Lean is an approach that is making its way into institutional organizations in order to help prioritize, do more with less, and increase value for customers and employees doing the work to serve them. It is a particularly useful approach to be considered for developing a prioritized approach to meet institutional facilities customer needs, so that facilities managers achieve more of their desired outcomes.